1798

Summary

Esteemed friend and teacher,

I thank you sincerely for your kind letter which did my heart good. My veneration for you is so great that you could not offend me in any way; certainly not by anything as easily explained as your delay in responding to me. But it would have depressed me, having achieved what I took to be your good opinion of me, to see it lost. I live in the midst of people who delight in gossip and story-mongering. I don't mean by that our Jena, where for the most part people have more serious things to do, but the whole area around here. For years I have heard anecdotes of all sorts. I can well imagine how one might finally get sick of philosophy. It is not the natural air for human beings to breathe – it is not the end but the means. A person who has achieved the end – full development of his mind and complete harmony with himself – will put aside the means. That is your situation, esteemed old man.

Since you yourself say that “you gladly leave to others the subtlety of theoretical speculation, especially when it concerns the outer apexes,” I feel more at ease about the adverse judgments of my system which practically everybody in the multitudinous ranks of German philosophers claims to have heard from you.